Plagiarism - How it Happens and Ways to Prevent it
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The document discusses different types of "credit poaching", which is when someone takes credit for an idea or work that belongs to someone else. It outlines 8 common "strokes" or tactics that "Viles" use to poach credit, such as claiming an idea was a team effort, claiming to be working on an idea without delivering, or taking credit for the work of past colleagues. It provides advice to help people document their ideas to prevent credit poaching, as well as advice for Viles to focus on their own merit rather than taking credit, and advice for leaders to properly recognize original innovators.
Plagiarism - How it Happens and Ways to Prevent it
- 2. CHAPTER ONE CREDIT POACHING Shared information always creates the potential for poaching of credit. Credit Poaching is an act where someone takes an idea you have developed or a result you have borne and claims it as his own. To make matters worse, he gets the kudos for it and not you. American medical researcher, Dr. Jonas Salk, announced the vaccine against polio on CBS national radio network, and two days later through an article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. In doing so, he broke all protocol of the scientific community by going public with a discovery before showing it to the scientists, and took exclusive credit for the vaccine without acknowledging the contributions of those who had paved the way for his success. This disrespect for the orthodoxies of his community left him isolated and frustrated in later VILE — How He Operates | 3
- 3. years, and he found himself struggling for funding and cooperation. But many credit poachers do better than him. Credit poaching happens everywhere — in the world of science, art, business, or in the theatres of sports, films or politics. Credit poaching has several strokes. The ones most commonly used are outlined below. Stroke A — It’s teamwork. When the idea is not Vile's and there is no way he can plagiarize it, he labels it as 'teamwork'. The originator of the idea is thereby forgotten and Vile is taken to be the modest and generous leader, crediting his idea to the hard work of the team. Stroke B — The idea is raw. I will get back to you. This stroke is a wedge technique, with the purpose of ascertaining if the creator of the idea will allow co-authorship or not. If the creator disallows co-authorship, Vile just keeps sitting on the idea, without allowing it to manifest. This way, if Vile does not gain credit for it, nobody does. Stroke C — Claiming posthumous credit. This stroke is played by veteran Viles. All ideas of erstwhile stars of the team are passed off as their own. Since the intellectual property infringed upon does not have an owner to defend it, there is little dispute over the issue. As a corollary of this stroke, the blame for the failure of ideas is conveniently dumped on to those who are no more on the scene. Stroke D — Usurping someone's results. Sometimes people steal ideas and sometimes they steal the credit for results. Result stealing often happens in organizations which have productivity linked incentive schemes where Vile tries to lay claim to his colleague's achievements. 4 | How a Good Person can Really Win
- 4. Stroke E — Claiming credit on the horizon. Sometimes Vile comes to know that a project is likely to be applauded soon. He quickly joins the team formally or informally and puts his shoulder to the wheel in the hope that by the time it is time for celebration his support would be well recognized and the fact that it is recent would go unnoticed. Stroke F — Doling out details of the success story more authentically than others. When the beaming Vile furnishes in-depth details of his success story, the innocent audience concludes that he is indeed the father of the idea, for how else would he have access to such detailed descriptions? In this stroke, there is a liberal use of words, such as us and we, so that the clever Vile is also seen, by the audience, as being generous enough to share some credit with his team members. This trick of using the chorus style to sing a solo song also confuses his team members. The gullible among them might even think that he is highlighting their achievements. Not quite. He is establishing paternity over the idea. Stroke G — Defending the idea. This stroke is a cousin to Stroke F. Over time, many successful ideas come under public scrutiny, since the causal relationship between an idea and its result is not always clear. On such occasions, the one who defends the idea comes across as its originator. Vile gallantly runs to such defense. Stroke H — Compartmentalization and Implementation. This Super Vile stroke is all about secrecy and supremacy. Vile chooses not to reveal the modus operandi of VILE — How He Operates | 5
- 5. implementation to anyone. He first compartmentalizes the team and then briefs each part separately with limited details, thus keeping everybody dependent on him for the next-step information. He thus assumes the role and visibility of an indispensable leader. Advice for Naive • Best way to prevent your ideas from being stolen is to keep them safe. • Document your best ideas. Write down your ideas and put a date next to them. If you have supporting documents, printouts, drawings, illustrations, newspaper clippings, photographs and other stuff that have inspired you to come up with that idea, then keep those handy too. This will help you prove that the idea is really yours because only you can explain how it was created. • Leave evidence behind. If your boss or an officemate frequently steals your idea (or you are afraid they would), leave a paper trail behind. Don't rely on verbal communication only to share your ideas. • Send an e-mail or a written memo instead. Make a copy of the original and keep that. • Mail by registered post a copy of your ideas to yourself. Don't open the envelope. Keep it with you. If someone misappropriates your idea as his or says he thought of it earlier you can prove in court by opening this envelope which will bear the back date on the outside that you were indeed the originator of the idea. This is like a poor man's patent. I learnt of this stratagem when I sued Bollywood actor 6 | How a Good Person can Really Win
- 6. Salman Khan and prevailed over him in the court as I could prove that I was the originator of a concept which he had used in his film Veer. • Have someone stand as a witness for you. You could also reveal your idea in a very public way, such as during a meeting, a group discussion or even at lunch, when there is a group of people present to vouch for you. Advice for Vile • Survive on self-merit, if you wish to survive long. • Forget about making an impression. Concentrate on contributing. • There are two kinds of people: those who do the work, and those who take the credit. — Indira Gandhi Advice for the Ruler • Innovation usually threatens status quo. Use this understanding to reduce the political fallout of innovation. • Let the originator of the innovation be the first person to endorse it. • While appraising the performance of your team, lay special focus on innovation and have a formal mechanism to identify and reward the individual from whom an idea or initiative originates. • Share credit. Shoulder blame. VILE — How He Operates | 7